A blog about my thoughts on photography, sailing, and life in general.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

Sailing on Zippity

This evening I had another opportunity to sail with Allen Bates on his J105 “Zippity”. Allen is the organizer of the Houston Sailing Meetup Group. He also owns Seabrook’s B Sailing Club. Allen has been sailing since he was 12 years old. He is primarily a racer and is very knowledgeable in all the dynamics of sailboat racing.

This is the second trip I have taken with Allen on Zippity. It is always a blast. My normal sailing style is cruising so this is a very nice change of pace. You can learn so much more about sailing when you are on a racing boat that responds quickly to any changes that you make to your sail trim. Allen is also a very good teacher and freely shares his knowledge with anyone that is willing to listen.

For this trip, we sailed close hauled upwind changing tacks a couple of times until we crossed the Houston Ship Channel. Once we got to the other side, we tacked and sailed back across the channel. Once across we sailed a beam to broad reach in order to get the spinnaker ready. With the kite up, we flew up toward the Houston Yacht Club executing a couple of very good jibes. I have only had the opportunity to run with a spinnaker a couple of times in the past. This was definitely the best. This was the longest time I have had at the helm with the spin up. Great learning experience and a very pleasant sail.